If you are reading this after the second call, the one where she says "I'm fine, I just slipped again," start here. You are not a bad daughter, or a bad son, for not having solved this yet. It is not you. It is your bandwidth. You have a job, a family of your own and a mother on the other side of the county, and you have been covering all of it with the same twenty-four hours. You have been doing everything you can. You are not an expert at this, and it was never supposed to be your full-time job.
The second fall changes the question
After the first fall, everybody agreed it was a fluke. The rug, the dark hallway, the new slippers. After the second, the question is no longer what happened. It is who is there next time.
Local option: New Plan Care gives families in the St. Louis area in-home help so a parent can stay home: companionship, help with bathing and dressing, meals, and overnight care. Call (314) 405-0887.
You probably know exactly how the second one went. The phone lighting up at 3 a.m. The neighbor who heard her through the wall. The hour she spent on the bathroom floor before she could reach the phone. The drive down I-270 in the dark, rehearsing what you would tell your boss in the morning. Maybe it ended in an emergency room, with discharge papers that said "fall precautions" and nothing at all about who was supposed to take them.
The CDC puts the pattern plainly: falling once doubles your chances of falling again. That is not a reason to panic. It is a reason to stop treating this as a string of bad luck and start treating it as a schedule problem, because that is what it has become.
What caused the falls is her doctor's question, and this page will not guess at it. If you have not told the doctor yet, here is the sentence to say in the exam room. This page is about the other question, the one nobody at the hospital answers: who is with her during the hours when she keeps going down?
What you have been doing is not a plan. It is you.
Look at what is holding this together right now. The call every morning, and the way you hold your breath until she picks up. The Saturday you spent taping down rugs and moving the nightlight. The group text with your brother and sister where everyone has an opinion and nobody makes the call. The nights you sleep with the phone on your pillow.
That is love. It is also a single point of failure. Every piece of it runs through one person, and that person also has a job, kids or grandkids, and a body that needs sleep. When you are pulled between all of them, you end up feeling guilty everywhere at once: late at work, short with your family, and still not at Mom's when it matters.
It is normal for families to fight about this. One sibling thinks she is fine because she tells him she is fine. Another wants to move her somewhere tomorrow. In most families the deciding falls to the oldest daughter by default, not because anyone agreed to it. It is fine to want somebody who does this every day to lay out the options and tell you, plainly, what would help.
Readiness checklist
Is it time? Answer yes or no.
Answer for the way things are this month, not the way you hope they will be.
She has fallen more than once, or you have found her on the floor.
Someone in the family has had to drive over at night, or leave work, to get her up or check on her.
You call every day and hold your breath until she answers.
She now avoids, rushes or skips something that used to be routine: the shower, the stairs, the night trip to the bathroom.
A doctor, nurse, therapist or hospital discharge planner has said she should not be alone for part of the day or night.
You have cancelled your own sleep, work or family plans to cover for her more than once this month.
You and your siblings disagree about what to do, and nobody has made the call.
You are reading this late at night because you cannot stop thinking about the next fall.
If you answered yes to three or more of these, it's time. Not because you failed. Because this has become more than one person can carry in the hours left over.
Your answers stay on this page. Nothing is saved or sent. This is not a medical or safety assessment: if she is hurt, cannot get up or you cannot tell, call 911. The phone number reaches New Plan Care Solutions.
What help at home actually looks like
Non-medical home care is not a nursing home and it is not medical care. It is a trained person in her house during the hours that worry you most, doing the ordinary things that have started to go wrong.
- The night hours. Someone awake in the house, so the trip from the bed to the bathroom is not hers alone.
- The shower. A steady hand in and out of the tub, on her schedule, so she stops skipping it.
- The ordinary work. Meals, laundry, dishes and groceries, the chores that have her climbing, carrying and rushing.
- The follow-ups. A ride to the doctor or physical therapy, and someone to sit with her in the waiting room.
- Company. A person she comes to know, which matters more than it sounds when she has been alone most of the day.
It can start small. A few evenings a week, or the overnight hours only, is a normal place to begin, and families adjust from there. For many families it is what makes staying at home workable. Questions about her health or her balance go to her doctor, and her medicines stay with her, you, her doctor and her pharmacist.
What happens when you call
If you have ever typed your name into a big senior-care website, you may have heard back from agency after agency before dinner. This is not that.
New Plan Care Solutions is a locally owned, non-medical home care company based in Chesterfield, serving St. Louis, St. Charles and the surrounding communities. When you call, you talk to them and nobody else. Your name is not sold or passed to other agencies.
- One conversation. Tell them about the falls, the hours you cannot cover and what scares you most. You do not need to know what to ask for.
- No commitment. No set number of hours, no package and no pressure to decide on the phone.
- Private pay. This is private-pay care: the family pays for the hours directly. Ask about rates on that first call.
- It can move quickly. If it makes sense, care can often start within a few days of that first conversation, and they will work with you if a hospital discharge is coming sooner.
Call (314) 405-0887Rather write? Leave a note belowAbout New Plan Care Solutions
If she is hurt, hit her head, or cannot get up, call 911 first. Everything on this page can wait until she is safe. The floor plan for when she cannot get up is here.